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Many of the claims by the record labels are bupkis. It seems to be their business model. Instead of changing and embracing digital tech, they fear it, call it blasphemes, and sue the pants off of dead people et al. If I knew anyone personally who had been sued I'd jump o the piracy bandwagon to, I could not support and industry that will forcefully try to remove money from the people its suppose to cater to.
1.5 T is ridiculous. (I wonder how many sales have been generated by downloaders liking an artist and buying the latest CD?)

The odds of the FCC implementing net-neutrality rules just got much longer. "A bipartisan group of politicians on Monday told FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski, in no uncertain terms, to abandon his plans to impose controversial new rules on broadband providers until the US Congress changes the law. Seventy-four House Democrats sent Genachowski ... a letter saying his ideas will 'jeopardize jobs' and 'should not be done without additional direction from Congress.' A separate letter from 37 Senate Republicans, also sent Monday, was more pointed. It accused Genachowski of pushing 'heavy-handed 19th century regulations' that are 'inconceivable' as well as illegal. ... [U]nless something unexpected happens, the fight over Net neutrality will shift a few blocks down Independence Avenue from the FCC to Capitol Hill. (In an editorial Monday, The Washington Post called for just that.)"

The Bad Astronomer writes "As much as 90% of previously hidden galaxies in the distant Universe have been found by astronomers using the Very Large Telescope in Chile. Previous surveys had looked for distant (10 billion light years away) galaxies by searching in a wavelength of ultraviolet light emitted by hydrogen atoms — distant young galaxies should be blasting out this light, but very few were detected. The problem is that the ultraviolet light never gets out of the galaxies, so we never see them. In this new study, astronomers searched a different wavelength emitted by hydrogen, and voila, ten times as many galaxies could be seen, meaning 90% of them had been missed before."

krou writes "With a budget of £500, Robert Harrison used cheap parts, a weather balloon, some duct tape, a digital camera, and a GPS device to capture some great photos of the earth from space that resulted in NASA calling him to find out how he had done it. 'A guy phoned up who worked for NASA who was interested in how we took the pictures,' said Mr Harrison. 'He wanted to know how the hell we did it. He thought we used a rocket. They said it would have cost them millions of dollars.' The details of his balloon are as follows: he used 'an ordinary Canon camera mounted on a weather balloon,' 'free software' that 'reprogrammed the camera to wake up every five minutes and take eight photographs and a video before switching off for a rest.' He also ensured the camera was 'wrapped in loft insulation' to make sure it could operate at the cold temperatures. The GPS device allowed him to pinpoint the balloon's location, and retrieve the camera when it fell down to earth attached to a small parachute."

This "tax" is imposed to try and help avoid an American DMCA style law that would, in the end, screw everyone. If the "industry" gets their share then they will, hopefully, back off and let Canadians be free from their oppression.

They charge high prices then wonder why people don't buy their product. If they were a small business then they would go belly up, but since they are large they are safe and can bully everyone into bowing to their whim. They must have understood this at one point or they would not have gotten to where they are today.
THe economy in Canada, and around the world is going towards a Less for More model. THe consumer gets less for their buck which they are just ignore because their corporate profits are more important. (Sad)

Jessica Mischner writes "You've seen cars powered by the sun, wind and biofuels — but a vehicle propelled by dung? Yamaha just unveiled the first one at a golf course in Japan. The experimental golf cart doesn't run on cow dung directly — the poo is processed into biofuel which is then converted into methane — but it represents a huge leap forward for green innovations."

thermopile (571680) writes "Fortune is reporting that Steve Jobs will not be giving this year's keynote address, and Apple is bowing out of Macworld after this year's event. Marketing VP Phil Schiller is stepping in for the final keynote. Apple's press release states that "trade shows have become a very minor part of how Apple reaches its customers." While this may be true, the keynote addresses have been the only venue for major new product announcements. Apple's stock is taking a 6% hit in after-hours trading. This would appear to be the end of "There's one more thing...""

Barence writes "The Windows 7 unveiling garnered largely positive coverage, with many hands-on testers praising it for being faster than Vista. But is it actually? To find out, this blogger ran a suite of benchmarks to see just how much quicker Windows 7 really is — and the results weren't quite what he expected. 'The actual performance gap between Vista and Windows 7 is ... nada. Absolutely nothing. Our Office benchmarks and video encoding tests complete in precisely the same time regardless of which OS is installed. [...] It's tempting to see this as a bit of a con. They've sped up the front end so it feels like you're getting more done, but in terms of real productivity it's no better than Vista."